Wednesday, January 27, 2010

THE ORGAN GRINDER

Dear Agent,

I enclose details of my manuscript, The Organ Grinder below for your consideration. It is aimed at the thriller market and is 101,000 words. I look forward to receiving your comments.

Security expert Dominic Kane helps his journalist ex-lover uncover a medical conspiracy to commit mass murder and sell human organs to the highest bidder.Award winning journalist Rebecca Eaton crosses the closed border of a troubled Asian country to interview a Human Rights activist and known terrorist. Three days later, after her reported mysterious disappearance, she turns up at the border tortured, beaten, minus her memory and one kidney. When an attempt is made on her life in hospital, her employer sends Eaton's estranged ex-lover and security expert Dominic Kane to bring her safely home.

Kane wants Rebecca back and jumps at the chance to make her realise she walked out on a good thing. But before he can entice her into a reconciliation he has to help her retrieve her memory and assist her in exposing a worldwide medical conspiracy involving mass murder and the selling of human organs.Kane has to protect Rebecca from the men sent to silence her and the terrorists who insist she bring the medical criminals to justice or they will detonate four suicide bombs in London. As he helps her unravel her lost memories Kane finds the conspiracy reaches into Rebecca's family and the highest echelons of power.

5 comments:

Interesting concept, even though thrillers are not my usual cup of tea.

In your first paragraph you need a comma after The Organ Grinder, and I think the name of your ms. should be in all caps.

Second paragraph isn't necessary - it's more like a plot summary, but then you give us the plot summary more or less in the query. But it would work great for a one-sentence blurb for your novel, which is a good exercise for anyone!

Going on, I'm not sure if estranged ex-lover is redundant. Maybe that's just me, but any ex-lover of mine is going to probably be estranged. And I'm wondering how he can talk her into a reconciliation if she's lost her memory and doesn't know they are ex-lovers.

The ending sounds forboding - which is good for me. I don't think this needs much work, but you might just consider a few of these things for the future. Or not.

I would definately put the first paragraph at the bottom. It's important, but you want to hook the agent right off the bat. A word count and a title usually won't do the trick.

I agree with melodycolleen. The second paragraph sounds out of place and isn't really needed. you go into that in the next few paragraphs anyway. Also, I think you can condense those three following paragraphs into one or two awesome, knock-your-socks-off paragraphs that will really catch the attention.

In general, I like the plot of this book. Make sure to check for redundancy and grammar. What I usually do is have someone I trust read it over and give me their opinion (kinda like we're doing :) ) to make sure I get everything. Hope this helps! Good luck. :)

I agree with the others. Take out that one-sentence, second paragraph. Everything in it is said elsewhere and starting out with Rebecca's situation makes everything flow better and make sense.

Remove the first paragraph, jumping right into the story (unless you have some connection or specific reason for contacting that agent) and at the end, just put "THE ORGAN GRINDER is a completed thriller at 101,000 words. I appreciate your consideration."

The story sounds interesting (which is saying a lot from someone who isn't into medical thrillers. :-). Good luck!